The perfect act is empty. who can see it? he who forgets form. out of the formed, the unformed, the empty act proceeds with its own form. perfect form is momentary. its perfection vanishes at once. perfection and emptiness work together for they are the same: the coincidence of momentary form and eternal nothingness. forget form, and it suddenly appears, ringed and reverberating with its own light, which is nothing. well, then: stop seeking. let it all happen. let it come and go. what? everyting: i.e. nothing.
– Thomas Merton
Volvox is a system of 5 fonts (volvox 1, 2, 3, 4, 5) that create a variety of ornamental composites by superimposing.
Each Volvox font contains a set of 26 illustrations that are all characterized by radial symmetry.
Since all the shapes are concentrically composed – which means they all share the same width as well as the same center – they all align perfectly centered. Volvox is the latin term for any of various freshwater green algae that form spherical multicellular colonies.
Concerning volvox as a system of fonts this means that even though each Volvox character is able to function by itself, it is ultimately designed to be an integral part of a more complex structure (that is created by superimposing various shapes).
Volvox is inspired by the natural aesthetics of scientific drawings especially by the beautiful illustrations of Ernst Haeckel in Art forms in nature about which I was once writing on my old blog.
The design of all volvox characters is based on a certain hierarchy:
Volvox 1 = background_shapes
Volvox 2 = leading_shapes
Volvox 3 = centerpiece_shapes
Volvox 4 = bits&pieces_shapes
Volvox 5 = line_shapes
With the Volvox engine the user is able to create an endless variety of Volvox composites (the hierarchical order above is not obligatory while using the Volvox engine).
The notion of slowness seems to follow me these days. I’ve just read “Slowness” by Milan Kundera, which is the praise of slow living. In fact, the novel is more dealing with the issue of how the novel defines itself — how does the audience novelists write for change the way the writing takes shape? But, still… it is also the praise of slowness. Kundera in a lyrical meditation on speed and time, technology and the body, escape and engagement, memory and forgetting, says: ”The man hunched over his motorcycle can focus only on the present instant of his flight; he is caught in a fragment of time cut off from both the past and the future; he is wrenched from the continuity of time . . . in other words, he is in a state of ecstasy; in that state he is unaware of his age, his wife, his children, his worries, and so he has no fear, because the source of fear is in the future, and a person freed of the future has nothing to fear.” Speed is the form of ecstasy technology has given us, the novel proposes. It then asks, ”Why has the pleasure of slowness disappeared?”
And a few days after, I came across Carl Honore’s speech on TED. He talks about how the world got stuck in fast-forward. And mentions some funny examples eg. that you can even do courses in Speed Yoga or Speed Meditation these days (!).
Helvetica is a feature-length independent film about typography, graphic design and global visual culture. It looks at the proliferation of one typeface (which is probably the most famous type in the world and celebrated its 50th birthday in 2007) as part of a larger conversation about the way type affects our lives. The film is an exploration of urban spaces in major cities and the type that inhabits them, and a fluid discussion with renowned designers about their work, the creative process, and the choices and aesthetics behind their use of type. I wouldn’t mind to get it as a christmas gift, naturally together with the Wisdom book by Andrew Zuckerman:)
Wreck this journal by Keri Smith, one of her incredible artistic books, was designed to make people use their destroying force. It contains a subversive collection of prompts to evoke this force in order to make something creative. In this way a reader/user can be able to experience a true creativity (and probably surprise him/herself). There’s been a pool on Flickr presenting effects of this experiment for some time now. But there are also videos which I wasn’t aware of – one of them below (more on You Tube, search: “wreck this journal”). This whole concept of this book was a crazy and wonderful idea!
Happiness is intangible, momentous, flying treasure, but we all seek for it, in more or less conscious way. Alex Ostrowski tried to capture a bit of it in a book, that exists in only one copy. No wonder, it’s his happiness, but is it really?
Inspired by the idea that wisdom is the greatest gift one generation can pass to another Andrew Zuckerman interviewed, photographed and filmed 50 of the world’s great writers, actors, artists, designers, politicians, musicians and religious and business leaders of our time – people who have all made their mark in the world. He posed seven questions to each of his subjects—all over 65 years of age—and their answers offer inspirational perspectives and unique insights. They were all photographed without their natural context to make the answers more universal and enable dialog between them. I want this book, I want this book!
this is a notebook, journal, experimental place, laboratory, place for inspiration, ideas, communication, sharing ... about living, chance, sensitivity, creating, enthusiasm, flow, indeterminacy, randomness, impermanence, curiosity and longing ...
